Cropped screenshot of Peter O’Toole from the trailer for the film Lawrence of Arabia (film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After T.E. Lawrence (aka Lawrence of Arabia) finished writing his autobiography, “The Seven Pillars of Wisdom,” he left the only copy of the manuscript on the London underground, and it was never seen again.

Michael Lewis, author of Moneyball, recently delivered the graduation speech at Princeton University. In his presentation, he shared this story:

A few years ago, just a few blocks from my home, a pair of researchers in the Cal psychology department staged an experiment. They began by grabbing students, as lab rats.

Then they broke the students into teams, segregated by sex. Three men, or three women, per team. Then they put these teams of three into a room, and arbitrarily assigned one of the three to act as leader.

Then they gave them some complicated moral problem to solve: say what should be done about academic cheating, or how to regulate drinking on campus.

Exactly 30 minutes into the problem-solving the researchers interrupted each group. They entered the room bearing a plate of cookies.